Camping Merit Badge

What this page is

The Camping merit badge, laid out so you can see what depends on what. It is not a copy of the requirements: each step is a short label with a link to the official requirements, which are what actually governs and which change from year to year. Read the wording there and tick the steps here.

How a merit badge is earned at all (the unit leader, the counselor, the blue card, and why the order of those matters) is a separate page, How to Earn a Merit Badge.

The four things that have to happen in order

Almost every requirement here can be met in whatever order suits you. Four cannot, and the requirements say so themselves rather than leaving it to be worked out:

Plan the menu before you cook it. Requirement 8(d) asks you to cook three meals from the menu you planned for 8(c). Cooking well from a menu you wrote afterwards is not the requirement.

The twenty nights come first. Both 9(b) and 9(c) begin "on any of these camping experiences": meaning the nights counted in 9(a). They are things done during your camping, not instead of it.

Prepare, then camp. Requirement 7 is preparing for an overnight campout with your patrol. Requirement 9 is the camping itself.

The last one is a look back. Requirement 10 asks what earning the badge taught you, which is not a question you can answer at the start.

The one that takes the longest

Requirement 9(a) is at least 20 nights of camping at designated Scouting activities. A long-term camp of up to six consecutive nights may be applied to it, and two nights may be counted for each additional long-term trip. This is the requirement to start early: everything else on this page can be done in a few weeks, and this one cannot.

Where you choose

Two requirements offer a choice rather than a list, and the questions above the plan let you narrow it to yours:

• Requirement 3: navigating to your camping spot with a topographical map and one of a compass, a GPS receiver, or a smartphone GPS app.
• Requirement 9(b): two of six outdoor activities, from a mountain hike to a rappel. Answer neither and you see everything, with the optional parts marked as ones that may not apply to you. Nothing is hidden because you have not spoken.